The Hand of Ethelberta. A Comedy in Chapters
HARDY, Thomas
[Vol. III of 'The Wessex Edition'.]
FIRM, CLEAN COPY OF THE FIRST WESSEX EDITION
Published: Macmillan, [1912]
Stock code: 50455
Price: £24.00
8vo., First Edition thus, on laid paper, with frontispiece in sepia photogravure (original tissue guard present), half-title and title in red and black, and double-page map in the text, endpapers and half-title lightly browned; original maroon cloth, backstrip blocked and lettered in gilt, backstrip sunned (but all gilt wholly legible), a firm, clean copy.
Macmillan's 'Wessex Edition' (the name was suggested by Frederick Macmillan himself) was intended as the definitive issue of Hardy's works, incorporating all the author's final amendments. Published in 24 volumes between 1912 and 1931, it is beautifully printed on laid paper and elegantly bound. Each volume contains a fine frontispiece in sepia photogravure depicting a 'real-life' scene from the novel (here it is 'Corvesgate Castle') and a double-page 'Map of the Wessex of the Novels and Poems' made from Hardy's own drawing (now in the Dorset County Museum). 'The Wessex Edition is in every sense the definitive edition of Hardy's work and the last authority in questions of text.' (Purdy). Individual volumes are now increasingly hard to find. See Purdy, pp. 282-6.